Live On
by Tori101
Summary: Link tried to become the Zora, for the girl with sweet blue eyes and sad songs. But he could never truly replace Mikau. Lulu knew, she always did.


**Live On**

Link tried to become the Zora, for the girl with sweet blue eyes and sad songs. But he could never truly replace Mikau. Lulu knew, she always did.

_**Disclaimer**_: I don't own Majora's Mask or Zelda.

The waters of the bay sparkled on the horizon, the early morning fog slowly evaporating with the rising of the sun as gulls awoke to begin the day.

Soft guitar chords drifted lazily over the salty sea breeze and pale blue fingers shimmered as they danced across the strings. Small splashes of water echoed with delighted laughter and the peals of impish chirping were carried to the Zora's ears and he glanced up to see seven pale forms flying through the water as a larger pale form waded close by, ever watchful should one child paddle too far.

She laughed again, a lovely sound much like bells and the whisper of waves as a child flopped in her loving hands. Deep blue eyes, pure as the lake he loved met his dark gaze, and he smiled warmly, lifting a hand from his strumming to wave. Six little tails waved back from the water, the seventh having struggled in the grasp of its mother. A small smile graced her lips, and she looked off into the sunrise far to the east.

"Come play," she called out, and without another word, he was never one much for talking, he put his guitar aside and dove into the water.

* * *

"Mikau, you should race with me to Pinnacle Rock!"

"Go dunk your head, Japas, you'd get lost even now that the water's not murky!" Tijo chortled from his end of the stage.

"Mmmm…but Mikau lets me win, sometimes, maybe I'll be lucky." The bassist said with a noncommittal shrug and a lopsided grin.

During his bandmates' argument, Mikau stood back contentedly tuning his guitar with an amused smile on his face. Lulu had charged Evan with watching the bossa nova brood as Mikau had fondly named them, but the strict pianist had pushed the task off on another Zora who was only too eager to be able to be of some help to _the_ Lulu.

He didn't notice that Evan was asking him something till the sepia-hued Zora had yanked his top fin.

"Ah! W-what is it?" he asked hurriedly, giving the other an almost unkindly look as he rubbed his head.

"I was asking you if we should play the song I wrote last year during that colder summer." The larger Zora said with his arms crossed.

"Dude, that was my song," Japas pointed out, but Tijo patted his arm and the bassist sighed. "Weak, man…"

Evan eyed the other Zora crossly, but turned back to Mikau. "I think we need to work on your chords in the opening, could you do it now for me?"

Mikau faltered and lifted his guitar, seemingly having grown heavy in his hands. His webbed fingers hung over the strings for a moment, the fish bone feeling hard in his palm…and yet he didn't play.

"Well?" Evan snapped, impatient.

"I…" Mikau gazed at his instrument, and a sad look crossed his face for only a moment before it was replaced with a mask of nervousness. "I'm sorry, I guess I don't remember!" he revealed quickly, rubbing his neck.

As Evan sighed and lead Mikau towards his piano to instruct the notes to the other, neither noticed Lulu watching them, her dark eyes masked and her hands clenching her dress tightly.

* * *

Sunsets were beautiful on the edge of the Zora Hall. Always had been, always would be.

Often, Mikau would sit on the edge of the island and gaze off, his mind in another place. Often, the other Zoras thought he may have been affected by the temple and the past misfortune that almost befell his band and friends. But that wasn't the real reason.

Loneliness was a cruel mistress, and it plagued the Zora so. He guarded himself and smiled as usual, more so than usual really, but surely he wished for no one to worry. Honestly, he missed the companions he'd lost.

Gazing up at the blushing sky, the Zora sighed as he strummed a few absent notes on his guitar, unaware that he played the lullaby he'd so treasured for almost twenty years, not that most of them existed anymore, but he remembered and his mind was immortal. The notes may not have meant anything in this new land with oceans and snowy mountains and swamps, but his heart ached still.

The pale blue light he'd learned to live with bouncing around his shoulders, the quivering, tinkling body that sometimes hid beneath his hat…and the longing to find her again, if only for him to listen to her repetitive yet only caring shouts for him to pay attention again. And what of the pale white light that had grown on him? She may have been rough, sarcastic, sharp even, but she had burrowed into his heart and he missed her presence.

Flashes of emerald green and elvish laughter bordered on his memory with the familiar tinkling of wings, blonde hair and blue eyes blew past him, the song of the sweet little girl on the ranch whom had given him his best friend echoed in his ears…

And before he knew it, his fingers had changed the song and he felt the notes blow through him as they flew across the land, across the sea and towards the beach and grasslands beyond. With pained indifference, he refused to react when he heard the so distant neighing and pound of hooves on dark sanded beaches.

"That's a sweet song, I haven't heard it before," a voice said from behind him, and Mikau turned to see Lulu standing in the mouth of the cavern entrance.

He smiled, and his fingers spidered to play her bossa nova, the sound soothing and uplifting. But it faded as she drew nearer, her billowing fins making soft sounds in the wind as she sat beside him. He gazed into the water and he began to play the lullaby again, feeling his heart ache with memory and longing.

"You should play that one for the children, they'd enjoy it…or Evan would at least, if it made them sleep," the Zora woman joked with a small laugh, the sound of trickling water.

"Evan shouldn't hear this song, it isn't meant for him to steal…it's not even mine," Mikau admitted with a bittersweet smile as he rested his guitar in his lap.

"Oh? Who did you learn it from?" Lulu asked curiously.

"From…" A pause, and a flash of a surprised girl and the whistles of a powerful woman played behind the backs of his eyes. "From a friend…a long time ago," he added, though it left Lulu with a lost look on her caring face.

"Ah…" she began to say, to break the silence she had grown accustomed to with Mikau over the past few weeks.

"Let's swim towards the sun." Mikau suggested, and before Lulu could ask, he'd put aside his guitar and had flipped into the water. She watched his pale form beneath the waves, and then dove after him.

They swam together in the ocean that night, twisting and spinning, leaping above to break the surface and to allow the setting sun's fiery light to shimmer on their slickened scales. Fins billowed like the finest of silks beneath the water, reflections of light casting patterns over their pale bodies that no artist could match. And then the moon began to rise, and silver streaks pierced them, illuminating their webbed hands as they met beneath the water's surface and held as they flew like fairies of the sea.

No more words were spoken that night.

* * *

"…and with the help of the other sages, the princess was able to seal the dark being away so he couldn't harm anyone else ever again," Mikau said, his voice soft and gentle as he watched the children slip off into sleep within their clamshell cradle. One little tail wrapped around his finger and Mikau stared into the deep sapphire eyes that gaze up at him.

"_Thanks to the hero, the princess _needed_ to work with the hero, right?" _a small voice asked, and Mikau nodded.

"Yes…and when his journey was done, the princess played a song to make the world as it was, returning it to peace and erasing the dark time that the dark being had created so that the hero could return his sword and return to his life," the Zora finished, stroking the smooth, slick body of the hatchling as its tail fell from his finger and curled around its body for sleep.

As Mikau stood to leave the room and the children, he looked towards the doorway and saw Lulu standing there, arms crossed and a troubled look on her face. Mikau approached her before he left, smiling.

"What's wrong?" he asked quietly, earning a quick huff from the Zora woman.

"I don't like that story," she said, glancing away.

"Huh? Why not?" the other asked.

"If the princess and hero had loved one another, why would the princess erase his noble deeds? He'd earned his right, he deserved to be able to stay by her side as they rebuilt, not just…erased the darkened future." Lulu huffed, a light color to her pallid face. "Heroes deserve happy endings, and princesses are supposed to have them as well,"

Mikau grasped her hand in both of his, and squeezed tightly. "Some heroes have to understand that the world that needed saving doesn't have to fall to its knees before them," he explained, his smile tight and eyes sad.

"But, I'm not saying the world should have worshipped him!" Lulu replied back, turning her head to glare at him. "The hero deserved a happy ending and to be loved, if only by one person. She turned her back on him without giving a thought to how he felt!" the vocalist said, emotion making her eyes watery. She faltered when she saw her companion's wounded expression.

"No…he let her…because he knew it was right, even if he felt wronged by it."

Long after Mikau had left, Lulu sat beside her children's cradle, her gentle hands stroking their fins as she softly song their song, no one seeing the tears sitting unshed in her eyes.

* * *

The sun had almost set when Lulu found him.

He had swam towards shore hours ago and had seemed to have been sitting there in the sand, his guitar looking lonely beside him.

She rose from the water and droplets sparkles like rubies as they fell from her frame, the burning sunlight behind her illuminating her with light. Mikau did not wave, but she smiled and drew nearer.

As many times before, she sat beside him, leaning her shoulder against his as her webbed hand rested atop his own, her fingertips curling over the edges of his webbing. They listened to nothing but the waves rocking against the shore for a long time, undisturbed and almost content.

"He was very important to me," Lulu said suddenly, resting her head on her Zora companion's shoulder as she stared off towards the sunset. His polite silence was understood in that he wished for her to continue.

"I could never find the right words to tell him, but it didn't matter, because he knew." She said softly, surely. "He always did."

Lulu turned to him then, and Mikau glanced down at her, their dark gazes met, and she saw a flicker of pale blue somewhere deep within. Lifting her arms, she wrapped them around his neck and pushed her cold, smooth lips against his. He sat frozen, but his arms came to rest around her strangely, and her fins wrapped around him like a blanket as she pressed herself against him desperately.

Her hands slowly ghosted over his neck to his face, cradling his cheeks before she began to pull away slowly, reluctantly. Lulu gazed into his eyes, and with a sad smile, she watched them widen with horror when her fingers pressed against his skin and she began to pull.

With a pained gasp, Mikau shrunk in the Zora woman's arms and Lulu was embracing a young boy tightly, the Zora mask clutched in her fingers.

"I…I'm…sorry…" the boy tried to say, his words stammered and broken as tears filled his eyes, but Lulu shook her head, rubbing his arms with her hands as she pulled away from embracing the child.

Cold hands went up to his face and her smooth thumbs wiped his tears away. Sapphire eyes gazed into the boy's pale blue stare, and Lulu shook her head and smiled gently, brushing the boy's bangs comfortingly as she tried to soothe his desire to cry.

"I know…" she whispered kindly, leaning forward to press a motherly kiss on the boy's forehead. "I always did…"

* * *

The moon had risen and Lulu stood on the beach, watching as the boy murmured to his pony, the sweet creature chewing his hair and nipping his hat affectionately as they reacquainted themselves. With stunned clarity, Lulu realized just how much time Mikau had spent with them since the Carnival of Time, and she wished she too could apologize to the horse.

The boy pulled himself with ease onto the creature's back, and he trotted her close to the Zora woman. Lulu reached out to pat the filly's nose, and then turned a kind gaze to the boy.

"Perhaps I will visit Hyrule someday, and we will meet again," Lulu said warmly, earning an eager smile from the boy. "The Domain of the Royal Family has always been a place I wished to sing in, Evan may be able to get us there." The Zora woman said gently, holding both hands.

"Even without…" the boy murmured, a worried look on his face.

"He'll always be with us, in spirit if his body cannot be," Lulu assured the boy.

"And…what about the Bossa Nova Brood? Er…" the boy stammered, a rush of color flaming his cheeks.

"They will be fine…I promise. Perhaps they'll even wish to see the Domain as well," Lulu said smiling. Lifting a hand to press to the boy's cheek, the Zora allowed her watery eyes to shed their tears.

"But please, promise me that the hero will have a happy ending, Link," Lulu asked. "The princess owes him that, whether or not he thinks so,"

With uncertainty and an embarrassed blush, Link nodded and before the singer's tears could influence him to do the same, Link urged Epona around and galloped off into the night, away from the beach and the Zora singer, and soon away from the lands of Termina towards grasses and waters of his own home, Lulu wished.

* * *

When the boy had left, Lulu remained on the beach, gazing upon the waters Mikau had truly passed from. While wandering along the shore, she spotted something on the beach. Going towards it, she found the passed Zora's guitar, planted firmly in the sand as both a monument and sign of guarding.

Falling to her knees, Lulu traced the inscribed grave of Mikau, tears flooding down her face and heart heavy.

He had loved her enough to die for her children.

She would love him…continue to love him, enough so that she could live for him.

For him and their children.

But tonight…Tonight she would mourn him and long for him, and she would desire to join him or beg for him to reappear, even as a boy trapped with guilt and a sense of self-sacrifice greater than the size of his heart. She would scream and cry for him on this dead and lonely beach, cry her voice away till the sun rose…But in the morning…

In the morning she would live on.

And Mikau would, too, within her songs and their children.

Within her heart…

And within the pulsing heart of the boy who had saved them both.


End file.
